XML sitemaps: what to get right first

It is rarely the thing that gets a project approved, and often the thing that decides how it goes. If you only fix one thing about XML sitemaps this quarter, make it the first item below.

Technical fixes remove obstacles; content earns the position. Both are needed and they are not interchangeable. The version that survives contact with a real deadline is the simple one.

Start here

A sitemap helps crawlers find pages links do not reach well. The reasoning matters more than the rule, because the rule has exceptions. Most teams find the first pass takes an afternoon and the maintenance takes minutes a month.

Then this

Only list pages you actually want indexed. The cost of getting this wrong is rarely visible on the day it happens. It is the sort of thing that looks like polish right up until it costs you an enquiry.

Eventually

Keep it current or it works against you. This is the sort of thing that compounds, quietly, in both directions. It is worth deciding this deliberately rather than inheriting whatever the last person set up.

In practice

Search work compounds slowly, which is why it gets abandoned about two months before it would have paid off. Three things worth confirming about XML sitemaps before you move on:

• Someone can say what the current setup is without going to look
• Only list pages you actually want indexed — and you know whether that is true here
• There is a way to tell whether the last change to this helped

Worth checking on your own setup before it becomes someone else's problem to fix.